STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The former treasurer of a Mariners Harbor elementary school PTA is accused of siphoning more than $4,000 of the PTA’s money into his own bank account.

Police say Carlos Diaz, 30, of the 200 block of Broadway, transferred $4,022.55 electronically from the PS 44 PTA’s Chase checking account to his personal Chase account between June 28 and Oct. 27 of last year.

He was arrested on Tuesday, and charged with third-degree grand larceny and third-degree criminal possession of stolen property, according to Peter N. Spencer, a spokesman for District Attorney Daniel Donovan.

Mary Curry, the PTA’s current president, said Diaz came to her to inform her of a "discrepancy in the bank," sometime last year, but even after informing her, another $600 vanished from the PTA account.

Ms. Curry said the PTA gave Diaz until the end of the year to repay the money, and after that, she reported it to police. Since then, she said, he’s paid back $1,000.

Much of the missing funds were held over from the previous year’s budget, she said, though they also included a $2,000 donation for a new copier machine.

The PTA is in good shape financially, she said, because parents rallied to raise funds.

"We have actually gotten a very warm welcome from the parents and the staff," she said. "At the holiday fair, we made over $2,000."

When contacted by the Advance today, Diaz said the money was transferred to his account, which he shares with his fiancée, the former PTA president, by mistake.

"For some reason, Chase, the bank, they linked my account to the school’s account," he said. "It was all freaking weird, but we had no knowledge of it being linked like that until the damage was done." Diaz said he had initially thought the extra money in the account had come from his other accounts with other banks that had previously been frozen.

"I told everybody what was going on," he said. "It happened again. I don’t know how it happened again."

Diaz was arraigned Tuesday in Stapleton Criminal Court, where he was released on his own recognizance until his next court date Feb. 24.

"His position here is that he did nothing criminal," said his lawyer, Eugene Lamb. "He’s willing to work to rectify it, but he didn’t do anything criminal or with any criminal intent."